The first computer I ever bought out of my own pocket was the original iMac, but I never have bought another desktop computer in the decade that’s followed. A year I bought the iMac, Apple rolled out the original iBook, the first true consumer-level laptop, and my iMac quickly became the property of a relative as I became (and remained) a mobile user.
Since then I’ve graduated from that first clamshell iBook to a work-issued second-gen clamshell iBook, then a work-issued G3 white iBook, followed by my own early G4 PowerBook, which I replaced with a late-model white G4 iBook, and finally landed on my current first-gen black MacBook two years ago. Looking back I’m surprised I’ve only gone through six laptops over the years, as I rarely recall keeping one in tow for more than about a year. It’s not that I need the latest and greatest Mac laptop year in and year out for any kind of hobbyist or ego-fueled reasons (witness the fact that I’ve generally leaned toward the consumer-level machines when all the cool kids were plunking down on the “pro” laptops). Rather it’s the fact that I keep outgrowing them.
The typical laptop experience goes like this for me: Start off using it with about half the maximum possible RAM installed, and initially find that it’s such a fast machine that I almost can’t keep up with it. Within six months of installing newer versions of software and taking advantage of the new laptop’s more advanced functionality, it’s slowed down to the point where it’s almost slowing me down a bit. So I max out the RAM and find that the machine is once again a little faster than I am. Repeat the above cycle, and within a year I’m ready for whatever Apple has brought out next. That hasn’t always meant that I’ve gone right out and bought a newer, faster one as soon as the year was up. For instance, I hung onto that PowerBook for way too long in the hopes that the mythical G5 laptops were just around the corner, and in hindsight I hurt my productivity as a result. There’s no other way to categorize spending ten hours to do eight hours of work because you’re frequently waiting for the computer to catch up to what you’re doing.
The big change came just a little over two years ago when Apple basically skipped a generation by jumping from the G4 iBook/PowerBook architecture straight past the G5 (which they never could get to work in a laptop) and on to the Intel CoreDuo, which by all accounts was the rough equivalent of what we thought the G6 would have been. My MacBook felt like lightning in my fingertips, and it was a year before I even thought about taking the RAM from half-capacity all the way to the max; prior to that there’d been no need to.
The MacBook Pro had come out a few months before the MacBook, but I knew that would have been way too much machine for me. It wasn’t just that I didn’t want to plunk down a couple grand for a bunch of features I didn’t need, there was also the simple fact that I didn’t want to carry a fifteen inch laptop around with me. I was accustomed to twelve, and even thirteen was pushing it. But the standard MacBook was such a svelte thirteen inches that I bought one the day it was released. They announced it while I was on an airplane, and well, you know what I went and did as soon as I got off that airplane and heard the news.
Here I am two years later, though, and my dear MacBook has managed to slow down to the point that it falls behind me way too often. A big part of that is the amount of work that I do in Pages for the magazine while also having five or six other major apps open in the background out of necessity. Another part of it is that the hard drive is sitting at about eighty-five percent capacity, and while I continue to alleviate that with external drives, it’s a non-stop battle thanks to all the audio recording I do these days, among other drive-filling activities. I could install a larger internal drive and that would buy me some more time, but it’s the old catch-22 where I’d still be stuck with maxed-out RAM that wasn’t enough, a processor that isn’t going to magically get any faster, and so on. There’s also the fact that suddenly a thirteen inch screen isn’t quite large enough for some of the work I do anymore; as an example, the only way you can get a full page to display in Pages is by scaling it down to ninety-four percent, even after shifting the dock over to the side, which I don’t much care for. While it’s workable, gives you an idea of what I’m dealing with.
And so while I’m not in any hurry to rush out and buy something just yet, it won’t be too long before it’s time for a new Mac. But for the first time in a decade, I’m questioning one of my basic assumptions about buying a computer: do I really need it to be a laptop? You see, I’m a one-computer guy, always have been. The times when I’ve actively used more than one machine have always felt unnecessarily complicated, nothing more than a waste of time and frustration. Is the data I need on this computer or that one? Oh, I’m not sure. Okay, let me sync it over from one to the other. Eh, I’ll have to copy that over. Sync. Copy. Sync. Copy. Bang head against desk because you’ve once again left the data you need on the wrong machine. Gag me with a spoon. I’ve tried it a couple of times over the years, and it’s invariably been by far the worst computing experience I’ve ever had.
Bottom line is you literally couldn’t pay me to actively use more than one computer at a time, so the thought of having both a laptop and a desktop has never, ever been a consideration. And while I know some geeks will invariably write in insisting that living on two computers is “not so bad” and offer a bunch of syncing and copying tools to mitigate the hassle, it just doesn’t make any sense for me to go through that constant aggravation. I work from a home office. I live alone. When I walk out the door with my laptop I automatically have everything on it, and there are never any hassles. So actively using both a desktop and a laptop would end up being a bigger hindrance to productivity than when I was clinging to that too-slow PowerBook.
And even adjusting for my current situation, absolutely still holds true to. But in rehashing that old rationale, a couple of things come to mind. One, I’ve spent the past year using my iPhone as a quasi-second computer. Two, as a result of having my iPhone with me at all times, I rarely use my laptop as a laptop anymore. Back in the day, if I were going to spend the evening in another room of the house, I’d take my laptop with me so I could keep tabs on any email that came my way. And if I was going out for a full day, I’d toss my laptop in its bag and tote it along, much for the same reason. Who knew if I’d be able to find wifi along the way, because if I didn’t then my laptop would just be a pretty-loooking brick that I was toting around, but I’d take it anyway just in case.
But my iPhone has largely eliminated both of those scenarios. If I’m heading into another room for awhile, I can always just check my email on my iPhone if I get curious. And when I’m heading out for most anything that’ll have me back home before the day is over, my iPhone’s simplistic but always-on internet access is usually enough to keep me sufficiently connected – and just the fact that it’s always on the internet usually makes it an infinitely more useful tool than carrying my laptop, seeing as how finding wifi is still so very hit and miss here in 2008, even in the big cities. I’d rather know I’ve got net access for sure on a three inch screen than take a less than fifty-fifty crapshoot on having it on a thirteen inch screen. Plus the iPhone is just a little easier to carry.
So why do I still have a laptop? Simply put, it’s the last computer I bought and I’m still using it. Until my usage patterns began to shift and expand recently, it was all I needed. Nevermind that it very rarely leaves my desk anymore. Or that my five or six USB devices remain more or less permanently plugged-in because I never have a reason to disconnect them. Or that I’ve added everything from external speakers to a mouse to a stand in an attempt to mutate my MacBook into being a desktop system. Because for as rarely as it leaves my desk, it might as well be one. And that really opens my mind up to the possibilities.
I could just go get a new mid-model MacBook, which would have a significantly faster processor but the same small screen, same lack of a graphics card and same penchant for becoming obsolete sooner than a desktop. But for about the same price I could get a brand new entry-level iMac. The specs say that the two are largely the same machine, except hey look at that, a twenty inch screen and a graphics card (the lack of which I suspect might be slowing me down in the image-intensive work I do on multiple simultaneously open fifty-page documents in Pages).
And for about three-hundred-and-something days a year, that would seemingly be the ideal solution. Just having twice the screen real estate alone would speed up my workflow, I think. Multiple monitors just make me dizzy; I know, I’ve tried. But spreading out to twenty square inches after having spent the past three years having no more than twelve or thirteen to work with would be horizon-expanding.
But what about the rest of the days, those instances when I’m traveling? You see, then I’d still need a laptop, meaning that I’d need to keep my existing MacBook around for just such occasions. I know me, I know my work patterns and what works for me, and once I bought a new desktop, my laptop would sit in a bag permanently gathering dust when I’m not traveling, just as my old PowerBook currently does (I only keep it around in case this one has to go into the shop for repair). But for those times when I do head to Macworld for a week, or home for the holidays for a few weeks, I’d bust out the laptop at those times. If it’s just for certain occasions, certain trips, I wouldn’t mind doing a wholesale machine-sync from one to the other, on the way out the door and again when I return home. So long as I never, ever get caught in that nightmare I see so many so-called “power users” buried in, where they spend every day syncing data back and forth from one computer to another, every day trying to remember which machine currently houses which data, I’ll be fine.
Still, I don’t know yet. I’m sure someone will suggest I buy a MacBook Pro, but I look at the current model and I still see a machine that costs about twice as much for a bunch of specs and features that, aside from the fifteen inch screen, don’t do much for me. And I imagine someone else will inexplicably recommend that I buy a MacBook Air, just because they’re cool, nevermind that buying an ulta-portable laptop at a time when I rarely even use my regular laptop as a laptop wouldn’t make any sense at all. I’m also waiting for some genius to tell me to buy a Mac Mini (if that’s you, don’t expect a reply). Quite honestly, the last time I wrote an article like this three or four years ago, I was deluged with “advice” that came in the form of users telling me that I should buy whatever Mac best fit their needs, which is why I suppose I’m feeling a bit pre-emptively cranky in advance, but here’s hoping that the feedback this time around will pleasantly surprise me.
For a few different reasons, I’m not looking to do anything particularly soon – mainly because the realization that I’m going to need a new Mac just hit me last week and the revelation that it might be time to go back to a desktop just hit me this afternoon, and both of those concepts will take some time to sink in before I can make real sense of them. I’ve paid embarrassingly little attention to the new Mac models that have been released in the past two years since I cuddled up to my MacBook, so just the act of ingratiating myself with the current lineup will take some time as well. I don’t see myself making a move one way or the other until at least after I return from New Media Expo, as it just makes sense to have my main (one and only) machine with me for the week that I’m out there. Once I get back home from that, and I know I’ll likely be parked at home base for at least a few months, then I’ll go ahead and figure it out decisively and make my move.
In the mean time, it’s time to offload yet more data to the external drives, in what has at this point become a weekly ritual. Funny how the air of invincibility that my MacBook gave off two years ago when it was brand new has since succumbed to the same fate as every other computer I’ve ever bought: at a certain point in their life cycle, aging computers become more about maintenance than magic.
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